Jump to content
Sports Interactive Community

The Official English National Football Team Thread

aggressive minor

By aggressive minor,
in 2010 World Cup Forum

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 4.5k
  • Created
  • Last Reply
crouchaldinho

crouchaldinho

Posted
Posted

This article is spot on as well - http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/davidbond/2010/06/germans_rich_pedigree_casts_la.html

German's rich pedigree casts large shadow

Sunday's classic contest between England and Germany is not only a battle to decide who reaches the quarter-finals of this World Cup. The game in Bloemfontein also presents an opportunity to assess the ideological and cultural differences between these two great footballing rivals.

Ever since England's heartbreaking semi-final defeat by West Germany in Italy in 1990, English football has undergone a commercial revolution which has made the Premier League the richest in the world.

Sunday's classic contest between England and Germany is not only a battle to decide who reaches the quarter-finals of this World Cup. The game in Bloemfontein also presents an opportunity to assess the ideological and cultural differences between these two great footballing rivals.

Ever since England's heartbreaking semi-final defeat by West Germany in Italy in 1990, English football has undergone a commercial revolution which has made the Premier League the richest in the world.

On the plus side, that financial success, created by the breakaway of the Premier League in 1992, has helped finance a vast improvement in the nation's stadiums, more entertaining football and allowed English clubs to become the most consistently successful in the Champions League over the last decade.

This has been thanks, in no small part, to relaxed ownership regulations that allowed new billionaire owners to buy clubs and then splash out eye-watering sums to pay foreign stars massive salaries.

But, at the same time, the English national team has gone backwards. Despite the Football Association enjoying its own substantial growth in revenues on the back of the game's television rights boom, it seems money has had a negative impact on the health of the English team.

The Germans, on the other hand, have gone from strength to strength. Although they have not won the World Cup since 1990, their rich tournament pedigree speaks volumes. They also won the 2008 Under-19 European Championships and the 2010 Under- 21 European Championships, although it is worth adding that England's Under-17 team have just won the European title.

The Bundesliga is still one of the wealthiest leagues in Europe, but it makes £500m a year less than the Premier League. Despite that, it invests £20m more in its youth academy system and its 18 clubs in 2009 made an operating profit of £146m - £66m more than the combined operating profits of the 20 Premier League clubs.

The Bundesliga's approach to financial regulation and ownership is much stricter than its English rival. While the Premier League is only now tightening its rules in the wake of Portsmouth's financial collapse, German clubs operate on the 50+1 principle - no single person or entity can own more than 49% as 51% of each club must be owned by its members.

Also, while debt levels have exploded in the English game with a combination of bank debt and so-called 'soft loans' from owners and directors contributing to a staggering total of £3.3bn according to Deloitte, German clubs owe just £30m. It must be stated here that most German clubs do not own their grounds and therefore do not have assets to borrow against (and some clubs would like these tough rules relaxed) but the difference in debt levels is striking.

The key word is sustainability and while the Premier League is just starting to understand why this is important, English football is many years behind Germany.

All very interesting, but why should the German model have any bearing on the strength of the German national team?

Answer: Because it demonstrates that the Deutscher Fussball Bund (DFB) has a far firmer control of the way the game is run than England's own FA, which long ago ceded financial control of the game to the Premier League.

A far healthier balance of power exists between the Bundesliga and the DFB, allowing them to put the wider interests of the game first - and ultimately every four years that means the German World Cup squad.

For example, German clubs must pick 12 home-grown players in their matchday squads, whereas the Premier League conforms to Uefa's rule of eight out of a 25-man squad - and even then that can mean including foreign nationals as long as they have trained for three years at a Premier League club's academy.

The German academy system educates 5,000 players between the age of 12 and 18. As a consequence, the number of German under-23-year-olds playing regularly in the Bundesliga is 15% - up from 6% a decade ago.

This is reflected in the youthful make-up of the German team here in South Africa. This is the youngest team (average age 25) they have sent to a World Cup since 1934. England by way of contrast have sent their oldest in history (28).

I asked Wolfgang Niersbach, the general secretary of the DFB, why it was that the Germany was so consistent at major tournaments.

"I wouldn't go so far as to say the German national team always comes first because during the club season the Bundesliga must come first," he said. "But what I would say is the relationship between the DFB and the League is very close and we work together. Sure, there are discussions, but in the end we always make sure the right decisions are made for the German team."

This includes a winter break - something former England manager Sven-Goran Eriksson fought for during his time in charge but which was ultimately rejected due to the crammed domestic season in England. German legend Franz Beckenbauer suggested on Thursday that the lack of the break was one of the reasons why England looked "burned out" here.

Many of these structural and ideological differences may count for nothing once the two teams take to the pitch on Sunday afternoon. But should Germany triumph, they will undoubtedly form part of the inquest which follows.

I'd be very interested to know how many of the German squad play in the so-called 'best league in the world'.

We all know that there is a major conflict of interests in terms of the Premier League and the FA. It's funny to think that part of the reason that the Premier League (Brian Glanville calls it the 'greed is good league'!) was created was ostensibly to improve the national team. This needs to be sorted for the English game to move forward. I'm not holding my breath though. :(

Link to post
Share on other sites
crouchaldinho

crouchaldinho

Posted
Posted
You do not have the best league in the world

I agree. What Joe Cole should have said is that we are paying the price for our over-hyped, bloated and greedy league. The so-called 'best league in the world' would be more accurately described as the 'greed is good league' to be honest.

Link to post
Share on other sites
SeanNUFC

SeanNUFC

Posted
Posted

I do find the bundesliga more exciting than the prem but prem has more quality only due to more quality foreigners being there i suppose, but we do have some good young players coming through, its not all doom and gloom just yet.

Link to post
Share on other sites
crouchaldinho

crouchaldinho

Posted
Posted

This is an interesting quotation from that article:

German clubs must pick 12 home-grown players in their matchday squads, whereas the Premier League conforms to Uefa's rule of eight out of a 25-man squad

It is worth noting that when this proposal was first raised in 2005, the rest of Europe embraced it. Germany, as per the quotation above, even decided to go beyond the UEFA recommendation. However, the Premier League immediately came out in protest against the idea that this proposal might ruin the 'product' - the Premier League. David Dein said that the Premier League would oppose this ruling and be prepared to go to the European Court to fight it.

As David Conn says in his book, 'this raised the faintly hilarious prospect of England's grandest clubs mounting an expensive legal action against European football's governing body, for the right not to play their own young players'.

Apparently, every football association in Europe went to Zurich to speak in favour of the proposal - except one: our FA. This is an example of how our FA has been taken over by the Premier League and how there are major conflicts of interest which are not going to do the England national football team any favours in the long-term.

Link to post
Share on other sites
brett.spurs

brett.spurs

Posted
Posted

Come on, it was only this year that we had no English teams in the semis of the CL, before that we regularly had 2 or 3 every year and had an English team in the final for 5 consecutive years. La Liga's European challenge is carried by Barca and only Inter did well in Europe - before that they regularly failed in the CL. One year doesn't erase the previous 6/7.

The top teams in England aren't as good as they were a few years ago and the chasing pack are closer now which makes it a little more competitive, the bottom half sides seem worse than before though.

Link to post
Share on other sites
gaga_4_parma

gaga_4_parma

Posted
Posted
Dont know if is far far far below. Imo it is below the premier league though. Inter winning the CL last season was mainly down to mourinho and some big spending imo. If anyone is being critical it is babelisgod

Inter didn't spend all that much money...it was something like a quarter of what Real or Barcelona spent for example.

Also in my opinion Serie A still has more pulling power then EPL...but purely because of history and club status. The majority of players will stll given choice would prefer to ply their trade in Spain, Germany or Italy...

Link to post
Share on other sites
Cinnabon09

Cinnabon09

Posted
Posted
Inter didn't spend all that much money...it was something like a quarter of what Real or Barcelona spent for example.

Also in my opinion Serie A still has more pulling power then EPL...but purely because of history and club status. The majority of players will stll given choice would prefer to ply their trade in Spain, Germany or Italy...

... I dont agree with the pulling power. How you can say that players would prefer Germany over England I just dont see. Italy is also debatable. I would bet the coming generation wouldnt be such biased against England when compared to Italy.

And Inter spent big on old players like Lucio and Diego milito. That goes for spending bigger than the sum itself says. mourinho didnt need to worry about that however because he just wanted the CL title and get out.

Link to post
Share on other sites
jmr

jmr

Posted
Posted

Serie A? Are you people serious. It's not as bad as people like to make out but it's nowhere near as good as what people like Gaga try to make out either.

Also in my opinion Serie A still has more pulling power then EPL...but purely because of history and club status. The majority of players will stll given choice would prefer to ply their trade in Spain, Germany or Italy...

Oh dear.

Link to post
Share on other sites
aggressive minor

aggressive minor

Posted
  • Author
Posted
Inter didn't spend all that much money...it was something like a quarter of what Real or Barcelona spent for example.

Also in my opinion Serie A still has more pulling power then EPL...but purely because of history and club status. The majority of players will stll given choice would prefer to ply their trade in Spain, Germany or Italy...

Oh gaga shut up with your anti-English taunts. It's tiresome. If you want to do it in a constructive logical way fine, but you just chat utter crap. I thought you were just obsessed with Lampard, but it doesn't stop there does it?

Link to post
Share on other sites
SeanNUFC

SeanNUFC

Posted
Posted
Oh gaga shut up with your anti-English taunts. It's tiresome. If you want to do it in a constructive logical way fine, but you just chat utter crap. I thought you were just obsessed with Lampard, but it doesn't stop there does it?

Agreed....

Link to post
Share on other sites
gaga_4_parma

gaga_4_parma

Posted
Posted
Oh gaga shut up with your anti-English taunts. It's tiresome. If you want to do it in a constructive logical way fine, but you just chat utter crap. I thought you were just obsessed with Lampard, but it doesn't stop there does it?

:D

Firstly Anti-English? So saying Lampard is over-rated and **** for England is anti-English? Regardless of the fact that Rooney and Gerrard are 2 of my favourite players? I said before the WC that Lampard looks good because of foreigners and his WC performance pretty much goes hand in hand with what I have said and nothing he has done will ever dispel that fact because at the end of the day it really is the most sensible answer and conclusion.

Secondly I don't think the EPL is as attractive to a player as Spain, Italy or Germany. That is my opinion... The fact is though it is difficult to say which league is the best...

Link to post
Share on other sites
Razzler

Razzler

Posted
Posted

Unfortunately the FA can't come up with any 'x home grown players in the matchday squad' ideas as it's nothing to do with them since they handed all their power away, there's the start of a big problem right there. Hopefully Premier League clubs will see some sense in looking within the country and developing home grown players, not killing the goose that lays the golden egg with people getting turned off the 'product'.

Wonder if the general depression about being rubbish again will knock onto early season attendances.

I used to say years and years back that these over priced English players meaning clubs won't buy English talent leads to clubs buying cheaper overseas players to 'save money' and these players will get the chance to improve playing at a good level and those countries will then qualify for tournaments instead of us thus costing the game loads of money and more.

We're buying up the best players from various countries and then allowing those counties to use their own league to blood all their young talent at a decent level

Link to post
Share on other sites
aggressive minor

aggressive minor

Posted
  • Author
Posted
:D

Firstly Anti-English? So saying Lampard is over-rated and **** for England is anti-English? Regardless of the fact that Rooney and Gerrard are 2 of my favourite players? I said before the WC that Lampard looks good because of foreigners and his WC performance pretty much goes hand in hand with what I have said and nothing he has done will ever dispel that fact because at the end of the day it really is the most sensible answer and conclusion.

Secondly I don't think the EPL is as attractive to a player as Spain, Italy or Germany. That is my opinion... The fact is though it is difficult to say which league is the best...

Look sorry I got aggressive there (living up to my name ;)), I shouldn't have done so. It does seem everytime I see you post its putting down England, but I was wrong to say so.

Lampard- we're miles apart on our opinions, no point opening that up again.

Spain maybe, I don't see why the Italian or German leagues would be more attractive right now. Obviously Serie A was befoe and Germany may well be.

To be fair to you, you don't ever start abusing other users, so I had no right to do that to you.

Link to post
Share on other sites
gaga_4_parma

gaga_4_parma

Posted
Posted
Look sorry I got aggressive there (living up to my name ;)), I shouldn't have done so. It does seem everytime I see you post its putting down England, but I was wrong to say so.

Lampard- we're miles apart on our opinions, no point opening that up again.

Spain maybe, I don't see why the Italian or German leagues would be more attractive right now. Obviously Serie A was befoe and Germany may well be.

To be fair to you, you don't ever start abusing other users, so I had no right to do that to you.

I didn't really think you were aggressive...and also I have maybe mentioned Lampard one or two time too many in my posts obviously if it's irritating people.:D

I'll try and not mention him again...:p

Link to post
Share on other sites
tigerhgrrrrrr

tigerhgrrrrrr

Posted
Posted

A comment I heard in conversation last night....

"the players were fxxxxx off with being treated like children, hence their bad attitude"

This was not I think meant as a criticism of the players, more a slight on Capello's managerial style - but I see it the other way. Very few top English footballers show the "right" attitude I feel, they probably need Capello's authoritarian regime - and even if they didnt, HE got the job so they have to work with it!. Accidentally this made me see the Capello situation very differently, although managers who fail at world cups invariably get sacked, and with reason in most cases, I am kind of glad he gets another crack at it. Still not convinced at the outcome though!

PS. Capello, if a match is going tits up - make a change. The worst that can happen is not that it gets worse, but that it doesnt change at all.

Link to post
Share on other sites
CMOZZA

CMOZZA

Posted
Posted

Considering the level of national debt that past Governments have put the UK in, and their only feasible way of getting that money back is to raise taxes, then I would call it getting robbed.

Link to post
Share on other sites
gaga_4_parma

gaga_4_parma

Posted
Posted

I think you'll find that most football clubs and players have very clever accountants who always manage to find ways of getting players to pay much less tax then they're suppose to...

I remember reading last year how some players and clubs avoided a certain tax by saying they were paying players interest free loans... :D

Also Spain has the lowest taxation level iirc a under 25%...Germany, Italy and UK float around the 40%'s.

Also as a plumber I can tell you my best friend is my accountant... :D

Link to post
Share on other sites
aggressive minor

aggressive minor

Posted
  • Author
Posted
I didn't really think you were aggressive...and also I have maybe mentioned Lampard one or two time too many in my posts obviously if it's irritating people.:D

I'll try and not mention him again...:p

So despite finding your views annoying, you've actually come across quite well!

Yep, me and you could argue about Lampard all day!

Link to post
Share on other sites
lawd

lawd

Posted
Posted

There is amazingly trouble in getting some teams to release players for the U19 tournament next week, http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/jul/04/fa-premier-league-players. Apparently Redknapp will allow the Spurs lads to go. But I find it staggering that in the wake of this World Cup and all the talk on the youth, some ENGLISH premier league clubs are being arsey about letting young players get tournament experience for their country.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...